e-Learning Stuffnews and views on e-learning, ILT and tech stuff in general…2015-08-01T08:49:40Zhttp://elearningstuff.net/feed/atom/WordPressJames Clayhttp://elearningstuff.net/?p=67562015-08-01T08:49:40Z2015-07-31T17:04:57Z

Four years is a long time in technology, but how much has happened since 2011?

Back in November 2011 I was asked by the AoC to present at a conference with Donald Taylor on emerging technologies and how FE Colleges should be preparing for them.

My slides and Donald’s are in this slidedeck.

My notes from that presentation are here, but how much has changed since then and had education really embraced and started to embed these emerging technologies.

Electronic Books

Who here has a Kindle or reads books on their iPad?

Amazon have said they sold more e-books than paperback books in the last quarter of 2010. They have sold millions of Kindles.

Apple sold 15 million iPads then they released the iPad 2.

It was in 2010 that JISC Collections started the e-Books for FE project which really helped libraries across FE start to embed the use of e-books and provide a decent sized collection for learners. Most learners should be able to understand what e-books are, how to access them and many are using them to support their learning. We still have DRM and copyright issues over “lending” ebooks and these don’t look like going away anytime soon. With the growth of learner owned devices and BYOD strategies, we should expect the use of e-books to increase. One thing we do need to consider is that learners are more likely to be using phones to access e-books and that the use and sales of tablets is on the decline.

Mobiles

So when was the first mobile phone call? 1946

When was the first handheld mobile phone call? 1973

Mobile phones are not a new technology. However the phone as a mobile computer, the smartphone, though about ten years old now, will dominate the phone market.

Does anyone actually buy “dumb” mobile phones these days? Or even feature phones? The cost of smartphones has dropped considerably in the last four years, yes the iPhone 6 Plus is a very nice phone, but a decent Android handset can be had for next to nothing these days. I do notice as I walk around how many people are using Samsung Android smartphones to do stuff on. Not only are phones getting cheaper, they are also getting more powerful and better at doing things. Back in 2011 the iPhone 4 had just been released and though the camera was good, it was nowhere near as good as the camera that can be found on the current iPhone or other newer phones. This means that they are better at capturing content than ever before. Storage has also grown, still can’t quite believe that you can have an iPhone 6 with 64GB of storage, I still think 64MB Compact Flash cards I used with the CompaQ iPAQ back in 2000 were huge.

Though smartphones are now the standard phone across learners, the reality is that curriculum design, delivery and assessment have not taken advantage of these technologies that learners carry in their pockets. BYOD is not just about the power of the technology, but also how effectively the design of the curriculum and assessment, and how this is delivered takes advantage of the learner owned devices that are carried on a day to day basis.

Augmented Reality

…is the application of a digital information layer over the real world. Hold up your phone to a building and get information on its history and current use. Hold up to a college and see what courses that organisation offers. In an engineering workshop, hold your camerphone up to a piece of equipment and overlaid will be information, on what it is, what it can do and relevant health and safety information.

Back in 2011 I used the example of QR codes been used to transfer links from library shelves to a user’s mobile phone. Today we have technologies such as Aurasma, this image recognition technology uses a smartphone’s or tablet’s camera to recognize real world images and then overlay media on top of them in the form of animations, videos, 3D models and web pages.

In many ways this is quite easy to do, however what is more challenging is to create the effective content that sits behind the Aurasma experience (and to be honest QR codes as well).

What augmented reality shows us is that often the real challenge is not the embedding of the technology, anyone can print QR codes or markers for tools such as Aurasma, but much more what does the learner experience as a result of engaging with the markers and codes?

Game-based Learning

Casual and mobile gaming is really big now in the UK. From the Nintendo Wii , the DS to the iPhone and iPad, as well as the Playstation and xBox. Gaming is huge and lots of different people do it.

When we talk about learners having a short attention span, can’t sit still for ten minutes in a lesson, how is it these same learners can play World of Warcraft for four hours…

Using games for learning is not new, as an old economics teacher I use to use paper based business games a lot. However video games now offer so much more and there are lots of ways that gaming can be used to enhance and enrich learning.

Back in 2011, many colleges were using Brain Training on the Nintendo DS and there was lots of talk about creating learning video games.

This infokit explores gamification and its application to the field of education, learning and teaching. It is written for instructors such as lecturers and teachers, and is also of interest to learning system developers, education technology organisations, metadata specialists, librarians, and anyone concerned with effective learning either within, or outwith, curriculum requirements.

There is still a long way to go before we see colleges and universities embracing and embedding gamification, even if they do it at all. The focus on skills and employability may mean the idea of gamifying the curriculum is left in the cupboard. One spin off that does appear to be gaining traction though is the use of badges and especially open badges.

Gesture-based Computing

The iPad is all about gestures. Microsoft Kinect allows you to play games without needing to use a controller. It won’t be long before we control our devices by waving our hands about!

I said in 2011 it won’t be long, well it is looking like it will be longer than I thought it would be back then. I have to say though gesture based physical interaction on the iPad does make it so much easier to use.

Learning Analytics

You probably already know a lot about your learners, colleges gather huge amounts of data about each and every learner, about them, their progress, their success and their failure. The question is are you making use of that data to make business decisions? Are you analysing learners on entry, during their course and where they go, in order to make decisions about which courses you are running and importantly which courses you should close.

Learning analytics is the measurement, collection, analysis and reporting of data about learners and their contexts, for purposes of understanding and optimising learning and the environments in which it occurs.

This area still probably has some way to go before it is embedded into colleges and universities, but there are many places out there who have been using big data and analytics for a while. In addition Jisc have a co-design project looking at analytics for the sector.

Universities and colleges use student data to help make informed decisions which can lead to improved student satisfaction, retention and attainment. However the learning analytics market is undeveloped. Organisations would benefit from tools and exemplars so that they can implement the best solution for their needs and priorities.

Our aim is to provide a set of basic learning analytics tools drawing from a range of data sources and using proven metrics.

4G

3G already offers fast wireless speeds, the future though will be 4G which will allow learners to have download speeds in excess of 20 Mbps, or even faster. This means that learners will be able to stream video content, access a range of media using mobile devices where and when they want to.

In 2011 there was no 4G, and now there is. My experience with 4G has been very positive apart from the cost! The speeds are incredibly fast making it possible to easily consume high quality content such as audio podcasts and video streaming, as well as upload content fast to the web.

We are seeing some price drops in 4G costs, but at the moment it is beyond the price point of most learners.

Connected Televisions

80% of televisions sold today can be connected to the internet, they can be used to access content and resources. Whether they are actually connected is a different question. However popularity of services such as YouTube, BBC iPlayer, 4OD and other content delivery systems, demonstrates that this could be a real way to deliver learning in the home.

Though some colleges and universities experimented with their own TV channels, the real way into the home through connected televisions appears to be through YouTube. However the challenge there is the creation of compelling useful content and avoiding the complication that rights and copyright adds to delivering video over the open internet.

A passing comment mentions other technologies

There are other technologies as well: fibre broadband, voice recognition, voice commands, cloud computing to name a few.

Fibre broadband is on its way to cover most of the country, well not my end of the street. The concept of having really fast broadband, is a reality for a lot of people, making it easier for homes to do multiple high-bandwidth activities all at the same time. Streaming HD video is seemed as quite normal and easily done through devices, computers and televisions.

Tools such as Siri from Apple and Cortana from Microsoft are showing how voice recognition, voice commands and personal assistants are becoming more and more mainstream. Google has built voice recognition into search, and though you need an internet connection for most of these services to work, they are a real leap forward from the voice recognition technologies we were dealing with five years ago.

As for cloud computing, well it’s probably easier to note who isn’t using it, rather than who is. Usage of tools such as Google Apps, Dropbox and Office 365 shows that cloud computing is embedded into people’s day to day activities, whilst tools such as Microsoft Azure and Amazon S3 (simple storage service) show how easy it is for enterprise level applications to be hosted in the cloud. Of course what cloud really means, is letting someone else host your data and applications rather than do it yourself, it’s still on a computer somewhere, just not on yours!

Predicting the future accurately is a real challenge, and nigh on impossible to do, however what is certainly possible and feasible, is to prepare an institution for the future. By ensuing the strategic approach of the organisation can accommodate what may and could happen, it makes it much easier to prepare for change and importantly take advantage of what the future might bring.

Over on “Don’t Waste Your Time” David Hopkins posts a nice cartoon of how to support staff in using emerging technologies and his interpretation of the roles within the cartoon.

‘Laggards’. Those who follow on once a technology has proven itself.

Late majority. Those who will join the implementation of something new once the initial buzz has quietened down and the research is starting to support its use.

Early majority. Like those in the ‘late’ majority, they will wait for the back to be broken on the testing and development before adopting and implementing, but will have been keen observers from the start.

Early adopters. Being involved and helping developing new uses for existing technologies (as well as driving developments) the early adopters will often be closely tied with the ‘innovators’ through professional connections.

Innovators. The first to know, the first to try, and sometimes the first to fail. These ‘technology enthusiasts’ will not stop when something doesn’t work, they’ll often try again, alter their approach or expectations, and keep looking around to see if there’s anything else they could use to improve work or learning efficiencies.

This is a nice model and people who are responsible for embedding the use of learning technologies will very likely recognise these stereotypes.

David asks with whom you identify with?

My observation is that we are all of them. Which one we are depends on which technology we are using.

For a long time I was a laggard (sceptic) with regard to Second Life and virtual worlds, really couldn’t see the value and how it could be used in an effective (and efficient) manner to enhance teaching, learning and assessment. It took a while and I remember seeing a fantastic presentation from Bex Ferriday on how Second Life was been used to create art displays that couldn’t exist in the real world. However despite that really nice exemplar, I still remained very much a conservative sceptic with regard to Second Life.

On the other hand, having used mobile technologies for years before the iPhone and the iPad (going back to the 1990s), I would describe myself as an innovator with regard to mobile learning. Very much the enthusiast and early adopter.

I would describe the model above more of an continuum than discrete roles that we fit into, and that where we sit on that continuum depends on where we are and how we use the technology. When you start to talk like that you suddenly realise that the Visitor and Residents model from David White and the work undertaken by him and Donna Lanclos resonates much more.

You could describe the enthusiast and early adopters as resident’esque behaviour and the behaviour of sceptics and the conservator majority as that of visitors.

One of the aspects of the V & R model I like is that as well as the horizontal continuum you also have a vertical continuum where technology is used between a professional and personal capacity.

Many years ago I was delivering training to a group of sixth form staff, one practitioner was quite proud of the fact that she was a technophobe, however when questioned further she not only used the internet, but used IM and Skype on a regular basis to talk to her daughter in Australia! What is apparent talking to many practitioners who don’t see the need or feel they can use technology to support teaching, learning and assessment, in their day to day life use technology all the time for their own needs and in their non-work life. These individuals can be sceptics in a professional capacity, but early adopters in their personal use of technology.

Models like the one above which shows learning technologists as bridging the chasm assume that there is a chasm that needs to be bridged and that people aren’t willing to cross it. It assumes that people’s view of technology is consistent across all technologies. It can be a starting point, but if you then move to the mapping exercise of the V & R model then it helps practitioners (and managers) realise that they are early adopters and sceptics and everything in between and that all of them can help each other to cross the many different technological chasms out there.

Of course one of the real challenges is to do this is from an holistic organisational perspective and get everyone to start to embed and increase their use of learning technologies where appropriate to enhance and enrich teaching, learning and assessment.

Ned Potter has published an interesting slidedeck on the relevance of Dave White’s work on Visitors and Residents on social media in libraries.

He describes the many different ways in which libraries can engage with users and visitors using a range of social media tools. One of the challenges when using social media in libraries is to focus on using it as a broadcast mechanism and not thinking about how to engage and interact with users.

There are lots of existing and new tools out there that can be used to promote, engage, collaborate and inform.

He does make the usual assumption of seeing the concept as separating visitors from residents into two distinct groups, when as Dave White makes clear in his video is much more of a continuum. When it comes to social networks people can be both visitors and residents depending on the context and what they need or are doing. You can be a visitor to Facebook, but you can also be a resident in Facebook. Resident in a personal capacity interacting with friends and family, and a visitor in a professional capacity, going to Facebook pages as and when required.

Dave’s recent video on Visitors and Residents and the mapping exercise shows much more clearly how the concept can be used to describe how an individual interacts with social media, and additionally the continuum between professional and personal.

Understanding how both the concept of Visitors and Residents and social media can be used to increase usage and engagement with users of the library is really useful, and Ned’s slidedeck and accompanying blog post gives you lots to think about.

One suggestion that I found helps, is if the entire team engage in using social media and that the tools are also used for internal purposes. This helps build familiarity with the tools, but also helping to understand what sorts of activities on social media work and what may not. One of the questions you will need to ask is how are you going to increase the social media capability (media literacy) of your team?

Over the last year or so I have been doing a few keynotes and presentations entitled the future of learning. I do start with a caveat that I don’t know the future for sure and that no one can really predict the future…

I then reflected on the past before looking forward.

Well for me the “next big thing” is e-Books and e-Book Readers. These will hit the consumer market big time over the next three years. We will see many more people reading books, magazines and newspapers via devices such as the Apple iPad, Microsoft Courier and other devices not yet on the market.

Well in May 2010, we saw the release of the iPad in the UK and with that came the iBooks application.

Though the Kindle was originally released in 2007, the third generation of Kindles released in 2010 were competitively priced and we saw more people buying these devices and reading ebooks.

By 2012 we saw a huge increase in the sales of ebooks, some of that was due to the success of “50 Shades of Grey”, but in 2013 and 2014 we saw a decline in the rate of growth of ebook sales, so still growing, but more slowly than in 2011 and 2012.

This demo will look at how augmented reality can be used as an entryway to learning, not just as a simple overlay of video content.

Augmented reality platforms have come a long way in the last three years and now offer far more interactivity options through simple drag and drop interfaces.

Examples were showcased to show how the technology can potentially be used. Advice was available on the range of platforms for development and their suitability for you. Selecting the correct platform for development is an important step on the route to effective deployment of the technology.

As with any technology, the key decision you really need to consider is how will this impact on teaching, learning and assessment and what difference will it make.

One of the interesting talks I listened to at the BETT show was from Bifröst University who had merged their distance online courses with their campus based courses.

From a learner’s perspective they received the “same” experience regardless if they accessed the course online or on campus.

The learner feedback was very positive as it allowed them to pick and choose how they accessed the learning on the course depending on their personal circumstances and context. You can imagine how one week due to snow or holiday they accessed the course online, the following week they were in a face to face session on campus.

In this blog post I am going to look at and discuss some of the technical issues that Bifröst University had to consider and out into place before moving forward on merging online and campus based courses.

Bifröst University in their presentation made some key points on the technical requirements. They needed to have in place a robust IT infrastructure in place to host and distribute the various types of content and video for the courses. They also needed to ensure there was solid scalable WiFi available to all users, taking into account the changing landscape of devices that learners would be using. As well as campus connectivity there is the issue of external internet access and bandwidth, as far as Bifröst University are concerned, they see really essential for learners to have access to high speed internet.

The other main consideration, that Bifröst University mentioned, was the need to have a robust Learning Management System (or VLE) and interesting for this to be backed up by good communication software and group productivity tools.

This is a very similar concept that I have spoken at length about in various bog posts and conference sessions, notably the VLE is Dead debate back in 2009 at the ALT Conference. What I said was that the VLE was an important portal for learners, but that didn’t stop organisations from adding in external tools. These tools could be Google+, Twitter, Google Docs, Office 365, or other communication and productivity tools. The tools that the learners use would then be accessed or linked to from the VLE.

Bifröst University also embraced the concept of BYOD and making sure both learners and teachers understood the limitations of this, but also ensure they re was a willingness to cater for the variety of devices that learners would be using.

One aspect that Bifröst University put a lot of emphasis on was on the importance of training and the large amount of training that would be needed. They certainly understood that even with a so called digital generation there was a need to provide training for learners before the start of the course, and this training would need to be repeated throughout the year. Training sessions were also run for staff at the start of the year, with additional micro sessions run throughout the duration of the course. Bifröst University also made sure they had good support materials for all key systems backed up by a range of guides and handouts.

In a future blog post I will look at the curriculum design implications of merging online and campus based courses.

Massive open social learning brings the benefits of social networks to the people taking massive open online courses (MOOCs). It aims to exploit the ‘network effect’, which means the value of a networked experience increases as more people make use of it. The aim is to engage thousands of people in productive discussions and the creation of shared projects, so together they share experience and build on their previous knowledge. A challenge to this approach is that these learners typically only meet online and for short periods of time. Possible solutions include linking conversations with learning content, creating short-duration discussion groups made up of learners who are currently online, and enabling learners to review each other’s assignments. Other techniques, drawn from social media and gaming, include building links by following other learners, rating discussion comments, and competing with others to answer quizzes and take on learning challenges.

When developing online learning, the lesson we can take from MOOCs and as outlined in the OU report is the importance of adding online social elements to courses. We need to ensure that these social aspects are as much a part of the learning journey as the content and the activities.

An expectation that these social elements will “just happen” is a flawed approach, and as with other aspects of the learning design, the social components of an online course must be thought about, designed and delivered in a similar way to the learning and assessment components.

Activities can be designed to motivate participants to engage with each other and create social networks within those taking part. Obviously with a large number of learners (such as you find in MOOCs) you will probably find this easier. With smaller cohorts it will be significantly more difficult.

It can also help embedding aspects of the course into existing social networking services and tools, but it is useful to audit which of these tools, if any, the participants actually use external networks.

Social aspects of learning are important to many learners and that is one of many reasons why learners choose to attend a programme of study at a physical location such as a college. The social aspects of an online course are not a replacement for face to face social interaction, but are for many learners an important aspect of an online course and will help support and motivate them as they go through the online course.